İsmet İnönü, Turkish general and politician, 2nd President of Turkey (b. 1884)
Mustafa İsmet İnönü (Turkish pronunciation: [isˈmet ˈinœny]; 24 September 1884 – 25 December 1973) was a Turkish army officer and statesman who served as the second President of Turkey from 11 November 1938 to 22 May 1950, and its Prime Minister three times: from 1923 to 1924, 1925 to 1937, and 1961 to 1965.
İnönü is acknowledged by many as Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's right-hand man, with their friendship going back to the Gallipoli campaign. In the Greco-Turkish War of 1919–1922, he served as the first Chief of the General Staff (Turkish: Erkân-ı Harbiye-i Umumiye Reis Vekili) from 1922 to 1924 for the regular Turkish army, during which he commanded the forces of the battles of First and Second İnönü. Mustafa Kemal bestowed İsmet with the surname İnönü, where the battles took place, when the 1934 Surname Law was adopted. He was also chief negotiator in the Mudanya and Lausanne conferences for the Ankara government, successfully negotiating away the Sevre treaty for the Treaty of Lausanne. As his Prime Minister for most of his presidency İnönü executed many of Atatürk's modernizing and nationalist reforms. İnönü is also noted of being the main perpetrator of the Zilan Massacre.İnönü succeeded Atatürk as president of Turkey after his death in 1938, and was granted the official title of Millî Şef ("National Chief") by the parliament. As president and chairman of the Republican People's Party (CHP), İnönü initially continued Turkey's one party state and Kemalist programs by supporting projects like Village Institutes. His governments implemented notably heavy statist economic policies. The Hatay State was annexed in 1939, and Turkey was able to maintain an armed neutrality during World War II, joining the Allied powers only three months before the end of the European Theater. The Turkish Straits crisis prompted İnönü to build closer ties with the Western powers, with the country eventually joining NATO in 1952, though by then he was no longer president.
Factionalism between statists and liberals in the CHP eventually lead to the creation of the Democrat Party in 1946. İnönü held the first multiparty elections in the Republic's history that year, beginning Turkey's multiparty period. 1950 saw a peaceful transfer of power to the Democrats when the CHP suffered defeat in the elections. For ten years İnönü served as the leader of the opposition before returning to power as Prime Minister after the 1961 election, held after the 1960 coup-d'etat. His chairmanship saw the start of the CHP's shift to "Left of Center" as a new party cadre led by Bülent Ecevit became more influential. İnönü remained leader of the CHP until 1972, whereupon he was defeated by Ecevit in a leadership contest. He died on 25 December 1973 of a heart attack, at the age of 89, and is interred opposite to Atatürk's mausoleum at Anıtkabir in Ankara.